Graph Theory: Introduction

Pallab Dasgupta
Dept. of CSE, IIT Kharagpur
[email protected]

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 Resources
• Copies of slides available at:
http://www.facweb.iitkgp.ernet.in/~pallab

• Book to be followed mainly:

Introduction to Graph Theory
-- Douglas B West

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 Graph Theory
• A graph is a discrete structure
– Mathematically, a relation
• Graph theory is about studying
– Properties of various types of Graphs
– … and graph algorithms

Why should CSE students study graph theory?

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 Graphs can be used to model problems
• The following table illustrates a number of possible duties
for the drivers of a bus company.
• We wish to ensure at the lowest possible cost, that at
least one driver is on duty for each hour of the planning
period (9 AM to 5 PM).

Duty
9–1 9 – 11 12 – 3 12 – 5 2 – 5 1–4 4–5
hours

Cost 300 180 210 380 200 340 90

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 Graphs can be used to model problems

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 Graph
• A graph G = (V,E) with n vertices and m edges consists of:
– a vertex set V(G) = {v1, …, vn}, and
– an edge set E(G) = {e1, …, em}, where each edge consists
of two (possibly equal) vertices called its endpoints.

• We write uv for an edge e={u,v}, and say that u and v are

adjacent

• A simple graph is a graph having no loops or multiple edges

– What is a loop ?

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 Digraph
• A directed graph or digraph G consists of a vertex set
V(G) and an edge set E(G), where each edge is an ordered
pair of vertices.

– A simple digraph is a digraph in which each ordered

pair of vertices occurs at most once as an edge.

– Throughout this course we shall consider undirected

simple graphs, unless mentioned otherwise.

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 Complement

• The complement G′ of a simple graph G is

the simple graph with vertex set V(G) and
edge set defined by:
– uv∈ E(G′ ) if and only if uv ∉ E(G)

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 Subgraph

• A subgraph of a graph G is a graph H, such

that:
– V(H) ⊆ V(G) and E(H) ⊆ E(G)
• An induced subgraph of G is a subgraph H
of G such that E(H) consists of all edges of
G whose endpoints belong to V(H)

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 Complete Graph / Clique

• A complete graph or a clique is a simple

graph in which every pair of vertices is an
edge.
– We use the notation Kn to denote a clique of n
vertices
– The complement Kn′ of Kn has no edges
– How does an induced subgraph of a clique look
like?

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 Independent set

• An independent subset in a graph G is a

vertex subset S ⊆ V(G) that contains no
edge of G

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 Bipartite Graph

• A graph G is bipartite if V(G) is the union of

two disjoint sets such that each edge of G
consists of one vertex from each set.
– A complete bipartite graph is a bipartite graph
whose edge set consists of all pairs having a
vertex from each of the two disjoint sets of
vertices
– A complete bipartite graph with partite sets of
sizes r and s is denoted by Kr,s

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 K-partite Graph

• A graph G is k-partite if V(G) is the union of

k independent sets.

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 Chromatic number

• A graph is k-colorable, if we can color the

vertices of the graph using k colors such
that the endpoints of each edge have
different colors
– The chromatic number, χ(G) of a graph G is the
minimum number of colors required to color G.

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 Planar Graph

• A graph is planar if it can be drawn in the

plane without edge crossings

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 Path & Cycle

• A path in a graph is a single vertex or an

ordered list of distinct vertices v1, …, vk such
that vi-1v1 is an edge for all 2 ≤ i≤ k.
– the ordered list is a cycle if vkv1 is also an edge
– A path is an u,v-path if u and v are respectively
the first and last vertices on the path
– A path of n vertices is denoted by Pn, and a
cycle of n vertices is denoted by Cn.

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 Connected Graph

• A graph G is connected if it has a u,v-path

for each pair u,v∈ V(G).

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 Walk and Trail

• A walk of length k is a sequence, v0,e1,v1,e2,

…, ek,vk of vertices and edges such that ei =
vi-1vi for all i.
• A trail is a walk with no repeated edge.
– A path is a walk with no repeated vertex
– A walk is closed if it has length at least one and
its endpoints are equal
– A cycle is a closed trail in which “first = last” is
the only vertex repetition
– A loop is a cycle of length one

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 Equivalence Relation

• A relation R on a set S is a collection of

ordered pairs from S.

• An equivalence relation is a relation R that

is reflexive, symmetric and transitive.

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 Graphs as Relations

• A graph is an adjacency relation. For simple

undirected graphs the relation is symmetric,
and not reflexive.
– The adjacency relation is not necessarily an
equivalence relation, since it is not necessarily
transitive.

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 Graph Isomorphism

• An isomorphism from G to H is a bijection

f:V(G)  V(H) such that uv ∈ E(G) if and
only if f(u)f(v) ∈ E(H).
– We say that G is isomorphic to H, written as
G≡H, if there is an isomorphism from G to H.
– Is isomorphism an equivalence relation?

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 Automorphism

• An automorphism of G is a permutation of
V(G) that is an isomorphism from G to G.
– A graph is called vertex transitive if for every
pair u,v ∈ V(G) there is an automorphism that
maps u to v.

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 Union, Sum, Join
• The union of graphs G and H, written as
G∪H, has vertex set V(G) ∪ V(H) and edge
set E(G) ∪ E(H).
– To specify the disjoint union V(G) ∩ V(H) = φ,
we write G+H.
– mG denotes the graph consisting of m pairwise
disjoint copies of G.
– The join of G and H, written as G∨H is obtained
from G+H by adding the edges
{xy : x∈V(G), y∈V(H)}
Is (G+H)′ = G′ ∨ H′ ?
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 Cut-vertex, Cut-edge

• The components of a graph G are its

maximal connected subgraphs.
– A component is non-trivial if it contains an edge.
– A cut-edge or cut-vertex of a graph is an edge
or vertex whose deletion increases the number
of components

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